


Killing Time

by DaftFloyd



Category: Watchmen (TV 2019)
Genre: 2019 Watchmen Continuity, Longing, M/M, Old Man Dan, Reminiscing in Prison, canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:21:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26247073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaftFloyd/pseuds/DaftFloyd
Summary: Short Drabble about old Dan’s life in prison and the unresolved feelings he still carries for his old partner.
Relationships: Dan Dreiberg & Rorschach, Dan Dreiberg/Rorschach
Comments: 3
Kudos: 29





	Killing Time

Daniel is used to the routine of prison by now.

He’s used to the monotony, to the same bland meals, to reading the same books, to living his life by a schedule not by his choice.

Daniel is used to it but he’s also becoming tired of it. To him, it all feels like wasted time. There were things he wanted, once upon a time. Family, a home, somewhere outside the city where he could read in a worn armchair by the open window while his children play on the floor by his feet. He tries to imagine Laurie there but he never can. Every time his mind drifts to someone else. Someone shorter and meaner with bright red hair and freckled skin...

He’s becoming numb to the irony of being locked up with the people he once protected the world from. He wonders if Rorschach felt that way when he was in his shoes. Not that he had to be for very long. It had been a matter of days until Dan came to his senses and broke the man out.

Dan still dreams about that night.

The night he and Laurie broke Rorschach out of Sing sing.

Even though he was with Laurie at the time and for years later, it’s Rorschach he remembers best. The shifting black pools of his face, the cracks in his leather gloves, the timber to his voice, the slouch and hunch of his shoulders…

When Dan dreams he can see him as well as if they'd only just parted yesterday.

Daniel misses him. He misses him more than he did in those years they spent apart after his retirement. It’s been over thirty years now and Daniel misses Rorschach more than he ever thought possible. No amount of time could ease that pain.

Sometimes in his dreams he tells him as much. There are points where he reaches the realization that one sometimes has in dreams, where you know you’re dreaming and that the person you see in front of you isn’t really there, that they’ve been gone for a long time. When that happens, Daniel wakes up crying and always before he can tell Rorschach how he truly feels.

In his dreams, Rorschach is facing him without the mask, without his disguise and Daniel too is without his. They’re not heroes, they’re not Rorschach and Nite Owl. They’re Walter and Daniel. Dan touches his shoulders, his face, and the tears won’t stop. He can’t get the words out because he just won’t stop crying. 

And then he wakes up with the image of Walter’s sad smile burned behind his eyes.

Daniel is getting used to the monotony of prison life but he’ll never get used to the pain. He’ll never get used to the longing.

**Author's Note:**

> I’ll probably write more of this and flesh it out one day.


End file.
